Maryjane and Lola

When you come to a new country at some point you will have to discover that the law is different and that what is wrong or right in your society not necessarily similar elsewhere. The topic of drugs and prostitutions, unpleasant thought it is, has been talked about a lot these days in my entourage. Maryjane is naturally a complicated subject because it is not as clear-cut as one might think. Though it is illegal, in the US and in France, it is also everywhere.

I cannot explain how shocked I was when I went to Amsterdam and saw the word ‘joint’ in the coffee shop menu. It was shocking, but the more I think back to that moment, it is also looked very logical. Indeed the Dutch model is quite realistic: if you cannot beat it, control it. So yes, when you go to Amsterdam you will smell and see maryjane everywhere, along with the thousands of spring-breakers that fly across the ocean for some 9 hours just to do it freely for two days. The Belgians are really close to adopt the model and I think the Germans will follow.

The funny one is prostitution. The French are shocked at a famous case going on in Paris: a Muslim minor who ‘frequented’ football players from Real Madrid and earned a good 20,000 Euros a month. Something along the lines of Moulin Rouge, I suppose. The joke is not on the fact that the world has to face that football players are men, but in figuring out whether they knew she was a minor or not at the time that they ‘saw’ each other. I realized that some French think prostitution is legal in France, because it is quite a custom here, and others say it is not. Regardless of what the verdict is, it is done everywhere in France for an average of 30 Euros per performance.

So remember to not be judgmental when you come live in a foreign country, amuse yourself, be prepared to see it all and hear it all, even in a safe and small city like Strasbourg.